


You Can Only Breathe If You're About To Drown

by Azusa_Calypse



Category: Teen Wolf (TV), The Maze Runner Series - All Media Types
Genre: A little bit of comfort, A lot of people get punched, Amnesia, Angst with a Happy Ending, Broken people, Cannon Continuation?, Gen, Glader Slang too, Hurt, I WILL update this I swear, I'm Sorry, I'm not an expert in PTSD, Intentionally Ambiguous Canon Timeline, Is it applicable to this fic? Maybe, M/M, Newtmas Reins Supreme, Nightmares, No Sterek here sorry, Nobody's okay, Oh yeah there's cursing, Orphan Newt, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Page 250 did happen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Minho, Screaming, Sheriff Stilinski is heartbroken, Slow Burn, Stiles Stilinski is Thomas (Maze Runner), Talk of being drugged, The Glader's are withdrawn, The Runner's Run sometimes, They're all hurting, Thomas doesn't remember, Weapon Handling, What the fuck is dimension cannon, and hurt, author sucks at updating, hopefully, lack of trust
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-16
Updated: 2018-02-16
Packaged: 2019-03-08 01:38:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13447773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azusa_Calypse/pseuds/Azusa_Calypse
Summary: It was only two days.They had only two days in their so called paradise, when a man and a woman stumbled in through the forest.Thomas thought that it might be another rouse from WICKED—get them to let down their guards with the seemingly innocent pair—but the stark fear in their eyes and the complete lack of recognition gave him pause.After the initial stupor of everyone combined, Minho took no time in having the duo subdued, tied and bound to tree nearby.Something didn’t feel right to Thomas, and he told Minho as much when asked, but all he got in return was a furrowed brow and pursed lips. The feeling only got worse as the night went on, throughout the next morning, continued in the afternoon, and till the evening’s light was just barely shining.Then another appeared, a man, with a round middle and worry lines rounding his face, wearing all black and a shiny badge, but different from the ones WICKED wore.The man could only start reaching for the gun strapped to his waist before they subdued him as well.With the group busy- they never noticed a similarly dressed man running away, they never realized that he wasn’t coming back alone.And that was their mistake.





	You Can Only Breathe If You're About To Drown

It was dark. 

Wherever he was, it was dark.

He couldn't hear anything, and whether that was because something happened to him, or if there was simply nothing to hear, he didn't know. There was a dull pulsing pain in the back of his head, spreading in thin lines to the beds of his ears. The pressure point behind his ears to be specific. He could go for a bout of whatever drink Gally used to make. Dull the pain in his head and maybe the drink would favor him and dull the pain in his heart too. Maybe he'd go deaf or something. Perhaps get tinnitus? A permanent ringing in the ears. Better than hearing nothing at all, he supposed. He'd need his hearing, and he would be good as dead if he lost it. Or worse, his friends would be dead--more of them at least, because of him being unable to protect them. Though, that might not be an issue anymore, considering they reached paradise. Thomas highly doubted that their so called paradise would last long though, they never stayed out of danger for too long. ‘Safe spaces’ never did stay safe.

A prolonged beep sounded somewhere to his left and he thought that it might be the start of his tinnitus death song. But it soon ended near a second after it started. Was it wrong that he was slightly disappointed? The noise starting again after another second passed. Was tinnitus supposed to sound like that? Coming in short, but steady bursts of sound? He didn't know.

He didn't know a lot of things. The things he did know, were learned quickly, and they only were known because they allowed him to know it. That was strange as well. Because some of the things he was only now knowing, seemed simple, but at the same time as if they were the most difficult of all. Like tinnitus. He didn't know how he knew about it, but he remembered seeing it on a page, only he didn't know from where, what text, nor why he was reading it.

He wondered if that was always how remembering things went.

The beeping came again and this time it was clearer, as if somebody had turned up the volume, but only slightly. It was still dark, but faint outlines of light were swimming behind his eyes, and Thomas realized that it was only dark because his eyes were closed. That was obvious. His eyes were closed. He should open them. Simple.

Only the simplicity of opening his eyes was actually a fight to get them to respond to him at all.

He had to focus, open his eyes, and look around. He could do that, couldn't he? Zeroing in on the task at hand made opening his eyes less of a challenge, and was sobering as well. He hadn't even realized that he was in need of sobering until he was aware of more than just his thoughts.

He was breathing (which was always a pleasant thing with the life that he lived), and wherever he was, it was cool, but not cold. He was laying down, something soft both over and above him, but not confining. His clothing had changed, he could tell after a couple seconds of thought on why it felt different. Gone was his mildly scratchy but comfortable shirt, and his pants were gone, leaving him in boxers, and what seemed like a dress. It was light, airy, and he didn't know why he was in it. There was something around his wrist too, smooth, and the edges were clean. Possibly plastic. He didn't feel as he should with dirt caking his face and other areas. He felt lighter and he assumed he was cleaned while unconscious.

It was still dark, and Thomas was surprised that he still hadn't opened his eyes. Thomas concluded that he must not have been focusing as strongly as he thought.

He really needed a knock on the head and a reminder to focus right about now.

With a mind that was less focused on the wisps of thoughts and using the slowly sharpening pain, it was easier to open his eyes. Piercing, white light, artificial things that he had only seen when he was inside WICKED compounds, directly above him and blinding. He flinched, feeling his face pinch slightly, before he started blinking to clear the light away. 

It was white. The room was pure white. Sterile, clean, and he hadn't seen such untarnished walls or furniture since... well he couldn't exactly remember a time when he had. The waiting room at WICKED wasn’t even as well kept. He cast his gaze around the room, noting to his right there was a door, two gray chairs that looked abandoned against the same wall that had the door. And to his very right was a small side table, with the clothes he was wearing before sitting atop of it. 

On the wall directly in front of him there was a lone picture, detailing a small cluster of purple flowers and green trees. The picture but a slight tickle against his memory. Maybe he had seen something similar before the world was ravaged by the Flare.

Finally to his left, an assortment of machines, flashing numbers he didn't know the meaning of and wires that were bunched together but not tangled. One machine in particular had familiar patterns on it, climbing things that went up and down at a steady pace. He saw Teresa hooked up to something similar once, he remembered her with her arm out to a foggy person handling her, looking at him in that disarming way of hers, a small smile playing on her lips. But that was as clear as the memory got.

A heart monitor was next to him, connected to his heartbeat. And it was doing that… by? And that's when he noticed his own various wires, except the port wasn’t a machine, but his body. Clumped together, but not tangled.

A sharp beep was all that revealed the spike of panic inside himself as he undid the various sticky suction cups plastered to his chest and pulled out none-too-gently the needle that was taped to his arm which had been slowly injecting a clear liquid into his bloodstream. He followed the dripping needle's chord back to the machine it was connected to and read the label.

MORPHINE DRIP

Now he definitely knew what Morphine was. It was sent in small shipments back when he was in the Glade, and Alby had told him that it was a type of pain killing drug that sometimes made whomever took it desensitized, or in other words, loopy. No wonder Thomas had been feeling out of it. He’d been drugged.

He let the line drop to the floor, not minding the small puddle of Morphine that was beginning to collect on the ground. Without the mind-numbing drug being continuously pumped into his veins, his vision began to sharpen and the haze clouding his mind was slowly dispersing. The adrenaline now starting to kick in probably helped the process along.

Thomas didn't wait a moment more than was needed, moving his legs over the edge of the bed and allowing the initial dizziness to pass before pressing his feet against the ground and standing. Wooziness was an understatement, it was like his vision was trying to flip itself upside down, but couldn't quite manage it so it continued to sway back and forth. Like one of those old grandfather clocks with the swinging pendulums inside.

The urge to throw up wasn't an uncommon one, but Thomas managed once again to subdue the bile currently climbing up his throat. Pressing a hand against his head he steadied himself and walked unsteadily towards the window. He pressed his head against the pane, his breath slightly fogging the cool glass before disappearing.

The view didn't make sense. 

It was a moonlit street with a large light held up by a metal structure. A lamppost his mind supplied somewhat helpfully. A paved street, some trees lining it, and a pavement walkway below. The area wasn’t lit like Denver was, and the sky--from what he could tell--was real. It was nice, pretty, no sign of sand, no sign of any crazy crank people wandering around. It was vacant. And Thomas couldn't help but find it eerie.

Movement drew his eyes to the right side of what he could see from the window, a lady jogging, something swinging around her neck, and... a dog. At least he thought it was a dog, he wasn't exactly sure.

His heart pulsed harshly. It was too... pre-flare, to constructed, it was something... WICKED. Had to be.

Would he never be free of them? Hadn’t they done enough? He killed Janson, or at least he thought he did. Could he have survived Thomas’ choking him? He had thought he had beaten Gally to death, but that wasn’t the case, so could the same be said for Janson? Or was it Ava Paige? Had she changed her mind? Or could it possibly be some other unknown person? Was this even WICKED’s doing or was there another crazy governmentalist group?

Somehow, despite the onslaught of unanswered questions filling his brain, he felt better. A little calmer. Question asking always was his forte.

First he needed to figure out what he knew. Which required remembering, and if his scrambled thoughts from a few moments ago were anything to go by- it’d be nearly as unhelpful as not knowing in the first place. Thomas sat back down on the bed he had been laying on before and hunched over. Putting his head on his hands as if that would help the process along.

Thinking hard, Thomas could only recall up to the point where they captured the man. That was most prominent at least. His thought process was slow but gradually, memories started piecing together. Another similarly dressed man coming back, though thinner and younger than the chubbier man, stepping into Thomas’ groups designated clearing alone, with his hands raised at the ragtag group. Minho and Michael--one of the older Munies who made it out with them--had stepped up to bind the skinny man when large probing lights were turned on.

It was quick after that. People, of all size, shape and gender poured in from the treeline, some bearing shotguns, but most with just loosely held handgun’s. With their weapons severely lacking and their numbers no match compared the larger group, Thomas and his group were quickly subdued. Cuffed behind their backs and dragged through the forest to where a boat was waiting docked on the coast.

Thomas could only quickly exchange a glance with Minho and a short one with Jorge before he was on the ship and placed within the throng of other Munies. There hadn’t been an opportunity to revolt or escape throughout the entire boat ride, but it was plenty of time for Thomas to notice some of the looks their group was getting. It was never the same person getting the raised eyebrow look of confusion, Thomas received a look as well. There was a lot of flipping through pages with people’s faces plastered on them by the unknown people. He couldn’t make out any defining features of the people on the pages, nor could he see the words printed, but what he did know was that there was a lot of pages.

There wasn’t any opportunity on the boat to revolt, yes, that much was true. But there was endless chances once they were _off_ the boat.

It was just a subtle nod between him and Minho, before Thomas snapped his head back into the man escorting him’s nose. It was a split second stumble backwards, but that was all that Thomas needed to start running. He only made it a few yards before a larger man tackled him into the ground, placing his full body weight on Thomas to keep him down. He could hear other struggling noises somewhere else; too many to just be Minho so Thomas assumed that other people had taken the distraction as a chance as well.

Thomas only saw the man swing up with the butt of his handgun before he was knocked out.

It explained the pain at least. They most likely moved him away from the others due to his unconsciousness. Or maybe he had a concussion. Both?

Shrugging off the thought with little worry Thomas stood up, looked around and walked over to his clothes, he quickly tugged them on and looked at the vacant side table, seeing the knife he had stored in the back of his pants was gone. If he was going to get out of here, he was going to need a weapon.

Thomas ran a hand through his hair and looked around the room again; recanvasing in case he missed something. He nearly groaned at how useless everything was, the chairs were plastic and the bedside table was shorter than his knee and that meant the wood was near useless. Maybe as a last resort.

The IV drip was more promising however. Moving, he unhooked the bags from the stand and turned the stand slightly on one side. One by one, he kicked the wheels off the stand, the screws and slightly pointed ends remaining. It'd make do. And it would always work if he swung hard enough.

Thomas turned it around in his hand, getting a feel for his impromptu weapon.

Not a moment too soon, a loud buzzer sounded, not dissimilar to the alarm that rang through the glade and through the Scorch Trials’ WICKED compound. But quieter.

A woman in a white coat and what looked like scrubs stepped through the door, followed by several other people pushing a cart with a machine on it. All of the people were so surprised, nearly falling over in fact. A teenage boy with one of their IV poles with pointed edges must be a lovely sight to see.

Thomas gulped and tightened his grip on the pole, eyes flicking between all the people that just stumbled into the room looking about as surprised as he did.

He took the woman standing at the forefront by the shoulder before he could really think about it. He held the slightly jagged end to the woman’s midsection.

“Don’t-” he took a shaky breath, “Don’t move.”

He flexed his grip on his pole and adjusted his grip on the woman’s shoulder to her upper arm.

A man near the back of the group took a step back and yelled over his shoulder, but it was swallowed up by the bustle outside of the room.

“Where’s Minho?” Thomas asked, not looking at any one person, “Brenda? Jorge? Gally? Sonya? Harriet?”

The people glanced around at the others in their small group before looking back at Thomas. No answers on their lips and hesitance in their eyes.

Thomas glared slightly, why were they being so obtuse?

Two larger men shoved through the people with the cart and directly to Thomas, they weren’t wearing scrubs like the other people, but closer outfits to the people that originally took him. One was white, bald and had a mustache that made him seem like he was frowning. He probably was frowning if Thomas thought about it, but the mustache seemed to emphasize it. The other was a slightly tanner man with curly black hair and a thin but muscled frame.

Thomas brought the woman closer to him, “Don’t. Just don’t.”

They shared a glance and stepped aside, faces unhappy, but unable to do anything.

Where were there guns? Two days out of WICKED’s control and he gets demoted from five armed-to-the-brim guards to two unarmed guards? These guys didn’t even have protection gear on.

He was a little miffed to be honest.

Thomas walked forward with the woman in front of him and shuffled out of the room before the burly men received any ideas.

“Okay, Okay…” Thomas took a breath and looked towards the woman, “Where are the people that were brought in here with me earlier?”

The woman--a blonde lady with dark chocolate eyes--was literally shaking with fear.

“Earlier…?” The woman looked at him with wide eyes, “Sir, you were brought in three days ago.”

The way she addressed him tugged at something in the back of his mind, but Thomas decided not to pull on whatever it was. Maybe it was the way she said 'sir' and not 'subject A2' or a variation of that.

“Are you telling me that I’ve been asleep for three days? Did you do something to me? Is this another variable?” He wasn’t aware of his hand tightening around her arm till she winced and Thomas relaxed, but only barely.

The blonde looked positively gobsmacked, shaking her head while her mouth fumbled to choke out some words. “N-No, you were brought in unconscious, a-and your body remained catatonic.”

Thomas bit his lip in consideration for a split second before deciding that they probably sedated him with something more potent than just morphine. Perhaps whatever drug they used to keep Teresa in her coma back in the maze. She didn’t answer him regarding if they placed him in another variable, but he hadn’t expected her to. WICKED was always vague when answering questions.

“Tell me where the other people are.”

She bit her lip, trembling, before answering, “T-They should be on this floor? I-I don't know who exactly you're looking for, b-but if you would just let me go, maybe we could-”

Thomas inadvertently cut her off when he started dragging her towards the end of the hall where he saw a stairway sign pointing. He’d look in the door closest to the stairway and exit. He’d need at least one person to help him get everybody out of here-and if things went bad--he’d need someone to conspire with.

He hoped that the person in the last room was either Minho, Brenda, Gally or Jorge, because he really only works well if it was with one of them. Well, 'works with' period.

It took less than a minute to reach the stairway door and all he had to do was walk a couple paces to the last room in the hall.

“Is it locked?” He asked, nodding his head towards the door for emphasis.

She blinked and shook her head, “We don’t lock any of the doors in the hospital,” She looked like she was going to elaborate, but she clammed up as she realized where she was.

Thomas just stared at her for a moment before letting her go, mutely allowing her to escape. By the time he opened the door the woman had run off.

Shrugging internally, Thomas stepped in the room fully expecting to have to slap some sense into someone from the Munie group. He was just assuming that they had all been doped up with morphine. Thomas didn’t really consider that it could be one of his friends, he didn’t want to get his hopes up since it was their 4 to the group’s 56.

It was slightly amusing to Thomas. That the first thing he registered wasn’t the person occupying the bed, but the side table in the room. It was vacant. No clothes. 

Was Thomas special? Was he the only one allowed to have his old clothes back? Or maybe this person’s clothes got dirty and they would be returned later. Did the person have clothes in the first place? He would have remembered if somebody had been naked when they were abducted for the second time in their lives. Perhaps they had been in the stream washing up when the people came for them? No, everyone was crowded around the fire that night. It was cold too, so a late night dip was probably out of the question.

Thomas supposed that it was always going to be inevitable, to the slightly long blond hair laying like a golden crown. Inevitably Thomas had to notice the pale skin, a faint scar along the left cheekbone. Full lips, relaxed into a slight parting, light pink, the bottom lip only slightly darker than the top and you could only tell if you were really paying attention.

He looked like a person. Like a sane, non violent, perfectly beautiful person. The dark almost black blood no longer stained his lips. There weren’t any pulsing black veins obscuring pale cheeks in a gruesome manner. And his eyes weren’t open, but Thomas was willing to believe that bloody eyes were once again white, honeyed brown, and no longer holding any of the insanity that was wrong to be present in them.

He looked small. Not skinny, because that wasn’t anything new, but small. Thomas remembered him being bigger. Not in a disrespectful way, but in the way that him and Thomas could be in a room together and his presence came through more compared his willowy exterior. He just seemed… small. A thin clear tube pressed to his nose and the tubes taped to his arm, liquid pouring into his veins—those things didn’t help the image that Thomas had of Newt at all.

Thomas was sure he wasn’t breathing. His grip on the makeshift weapon was tightened to the point where he thought there’d be a hand shaped dent in the metal. It felt like if he so much as blinked, the world would come crashing down again. If the utter stillness of the moment, the undisturbed air around them was so much as touched, it’d evaporate. The person on the bed would change. To a Munie who Thomas just didn’t know very well perhaps.

Or he’d turn back to the bleeding, broken Crank that he was so wrongfully turned into.

It was as if a gaping hole in his stomach had swallowed his heart. As if the acid in his body became more potent and started to eat him from the inside out. It may as well have been. That’s what it felt like. Only it had already eaten him and now it was breaking down everything around him. Not stopping till the only thing in the world was the golden crowned king on the white bed.

After what seemed like eons of simply looking, Thomas sucked in a breath, his lungs came back to life, thanking him for granting them the one thing they desperately needed.

His footsteps were silent, or were they like earthquakes? The ground trembling with every step he took. Or maybe his legs were the ones trembling. Thomas only cared to listen to the soft beeps of the heart monitor, the quiet breaths of the boy in the bed.

His face was peaceful, familiar yet different from what Thomas remembered. His hair was fluffy, only the smallest bit longer than he recalled, and there were no bruising welts where hair was gruesomely ripped out.

Time had been reversed. It was a dream. He had eaten a bad mushroom and was hallucinating. WICKED was putting him through another variable. 

That had to be it. There was no way that he was alive. Nobody could survive a shucking shot in the head. Could a crank survive?

The Newt he knew was dead.

That thought brought the dam bursting. Finding cracks in the plaster and pressing till they gave in and broke down. Tears he used to find shameful poured out of him with no intention of stopping.

Distantly, the sound of clattering metal could be heard but Thomas didn’t care. He was already falling- crashing to his knees. 

It _hurt_. It hurt so much. He suddenly felt the irrational desire to tug out his hair, his fingers already on his head and gripping painfully. Was this what Newt felt like? Was this _horrible_ feeling anything at all like how Newt felt? Everything was churning, breaking and collapsing in on itself. His throat ached and his head was throbbing from the pressure building up behind his eyes. His eyes even started to sting from how much salt his tears were generating.

Thomas took a breath, eyes ghosting over Newt, the image slightly distorted from his overflowing tears.

It was a mantra. 

_Newt. Newt. Newt. Newt. Newt._

It wouldn’t stop.

Did he want it to?

How was he to know if this was _his_ Newt? Could WICKED even create a fake one? What _was_ this? What was going on? Thomas’ hands flitted over the sleeping person, tears dripping onto dry cheeks; cheeks that weren’t his own. Thomas would realize later that he was having a panic attack, but everything was so blurry and hazy and just, well, messed up right now that he couldn't get his thoughts to slow down much less make sense.

Thomas sank back onto his legs, breathing heavily with fingers grasping at the material covering his heart, like that was the only barrier keeping him from ripping his heart out.

It’s okay hands, his heart's already been ripped out and hung on display for WICKED to toy and tinker with. Don’t try so hard, hands, it’ll end up biting you in the ass. If hands had asses that was. Or if anything he was thinking was remotely sane.

That’s when he noticed that Newt(?) wasn’t wearing the white dress-like gown that Thomas had been wearing when he had woken up. No, he was wearing what Thomas had last seen him in. The raggedy, old and still slightly ratty white hoodie that Newt had often worn around the glade and the blue long sleeve shirt that they had been given when they were starting the Scorch trials. Thomas couldn’t see his pants, but he would bet they were cargo pants, slightly ripped and dirty in various places, but otherwise fine. There wasn't any blood. 

Thomas wasn't sure how to feel about that.

And Thomas _knew_ he could be oblivious at times—he would be told often, loud and clear from anyone and everyone—but he could see that something was off. That something was just slightly skewed.

Newt(?) looked relaxed, yes. But was relaxed the right word? Newt looked... well, dead. It was a jarring thought, but now that it was there he could really see how it was true.

He wasn't really dead, he was still breathing, and with the quick glance to the heart monitor beside the bed, his heart was beating fine too, so why did he look so- so cold?

Thomas was still crying, but they were more of a subtle sort of thing that no longer blurred his vision. Thomas looked over Newt(?)'s body, nothing out of the ordinary until Thomas' eyes snagged on Newt(?)'s hand. His long fingers were clenched around something, his muscles subtly contracted to grip onto the small object.

With growing confusion, Thomas attempted to pry the hands open. It took much longer and was harder than Thomas would have imagined it have been taking considering it was an unconscious person he was up against, but when he finally managed it (with a jolt that managed to make Thomas hit his elbow on the side of it. Ow) he didn't immediately register what he had gotten.

Whatever he was holding, Thomas knew he had held it before. But he didn’t place from where until he looked at it.

Whatever faux calm that he had gotten a grip on before was promptly thrown out of the nearest window, stomped upon, eaten by a vulture and electrocuted by Zeus himself. (Whoever the shuck Zeus was that is.)

He looked at Newt, _his_ Newt. His real, breathing, worryingly dead-looking, friend- Newt. If that wasn't enough of a mind fuck, sorry, mind _shuck_ , then the shucking thing he managed to rip from Newts grip was.

_Chucks shucking carving._

Thomas had thought it gone for good, hardened that part of his heart and memory so he could make it through the day without reaching for it out of some misguided comfort/coping mechanism.

Thomas wondered why WICKED hadn't taken it. It had been hard for Thomas and wasn't quick like you expected it to be so maybe WICKED had given up? Let Newt win that small unconscious battle and decided to deal with it later? Or had they planted it.

Thomas wasn't sure, but he felt that he could afford to believe that his gut was right. That this was indeed his best friend and let himself believe in that small spark of hope. Just as Thomas was considering the pros and cons of unhooking Newt to all the cords placed on him, did the door fly open.

The same two men who had reluctantly let the woman and him pass and a new third man with them. Third man was Hispanic and faintly reminded him of Jorge, but his face was wider and there was no facial hair. He had a tattoo of some characters on his neck, but Thomas didn’t know what they meant. They all had protective chest plates on, but still no weapons, and surprisingly still slightly offensive. 

His adrenaline made it possible for him to think quick, his body moving to the unheard request and grabbed the discarded pole lying abandoned at his side.

It was him and the men now. No Launchers, no guns, no grenades. Just them. And Thomas had something- _someone_ to fight for, unlike them.

If past experiences taught him anything, you can do a hell of a lot, good or bad, when you’ve got something worth fighting for.

The split second hesitance vanished and the three men came for him. Thomas swung and landed a solid hit on the tattooed man’s stomach, whipping the pole back and smacking across bald dude’s face. Tan man however managed to tackle Thomas to the ground.

Thomas grunted, twisting his pole so he could take it in both his hands and managed to place it under Tan’s neck. Using that stance he pressed up, the man's body unwillingly being forced up due to the pole.

Another grunt and Thomas wasn’t pinned down by Tan, but Baldy had recovered and forcibly grabbed one of his arms. 

Thomas swung the pole again but it was caught by something and Thomas’ arm stopped with a jerk. Tattoo had caught the pole and was using his arms like a vice grip around the shaft.

Thomas growled and forced the pole down, straining from the effort, using his foot to help get it to the ground once he got the pole low enough to use it. Tattoo visibly grit his teeth, but managed to keep ahold of the pole. Baldy was grabbing for Thomas’ midsection but Thomas managed just barely to keep him from doing so by wiggling the arm in his hold and thrashing every now and then.

Thomas tried pulling his arm from Baldy to no avail, with a light grimace he looked at Tattoo and let the pole go. Smirking inwardly as Tattoo went unbalanced and stumbled back, crashing onto the floor only to hit the back of his head on the bottom frame of Newt’s bed.

In the heat of the moment, Thomas had focused his attention. And Tan used it to his advantage, jumping up and grabbing his other arm.

Now, this was starting to be worrying.

With newfound strength due to his increasing panic, and less care about protecting himself and more about not getting caught, Thomas jabbed his left elbow into Tan’s gut. Using the splutter and weakened grip his move provided him to take his arm back.

Twisting his arm still in Baldy’s grip to a position that wouldn’t break it, Thomas pressed towards the man. Taking him by surprise if his facial expression was anything to go by. With a few seconds of struggling, Thomas managed to trip Baldy up, sending both of them crashing to the floor.

He landed harshly on top of Baldy, his left arm still trapped in the vice that was the large man's grip. Pain laced up said arm with cold precision enough so to make him gasp.

Baldy seemed to be out cold, but Thomas didn’t want to linger on top of him any longer than he needed to. He gently pulled his aching arm from the burly man’s grip, huffing from the exertion.

Thomas turned around expecting maybe Tattoo unconscious as well, but he didn’t know what Tan was doing.

The moment he processed the change, a new, fourth man with a stern face and a buzz cut had come up behind him and scooped him up from under the arms. The man pulled back slightly and Thomas’ upper arms couldn’t move from the grip.

His fists clenched and he tried to thrash free, putting his shoulders into it as well as head.

The man moved just slightly and Thomas’ plan of whipping his head back into the man’s face fizzled out.

Tan came up behind them as well and with a swift move, Tan had a grip on his right arm and Stern face had readjusted to keep his left. His forearms were free, as well as his fists, but they were of little use, the handle they had on him preventing his reach. His shoulder blades were practically touching each other with how far they were keeping his arms back.

Strangled shouts came out unbidden and Thomas struggled fervently. He tried to use their grip on him as leverage, and thus gain purchase for a kick or two, but they shoved him down farther. Bent over to just shy of a 90 degree angle, Thomas glared at them with all the venom he could muster.

Thomas felt slightly like a neglected child, the men gave him no interest, instead Tattoo—who was obviously _not_ as unconscious as Thomas had thought—was checking on Baldy, speaking to the man quietly and feeling for a pulse with no response it seemed.

Thomas felt a trickle of pride, small and hidden under his fear and reining panic.

The men shifted and Thomas indulged in shooting them a glare while they did so. His arm hurt like a shuck-faced shank and what he wouldn’t do to for a drop of morphine right now.

He could almost laugh at the irony, but the thought of a certain pale faced blond was currently sending his brain into self destruct mode.

Before he knew it he really was laughing. It hurt his ribs and made his shoulder jostle horribly, but he couldn’t help it.

Shuck WICKED. Thomas didn’t shucking care what they did to him or to Newt as long as Newt was back. To his normal, sane self.

The men jerked him and he bit his tongue from the unexpected movement, cutting off his manic laughter.

A brunet lady wearing light purple scrubs walked up to him holding a syringe, tapping the glass to make sure there wasn’t any air in the concoction.

Thomas’ blood ran cold in his veins. He started mumbling no before he could even think about it. It turned to panicked yells, he scrambled trying to gain any tread on the floor. He jumped and shook his head, screaming for them to let him go.

Tattoo came over and pushed his neck down, hunching Thomas over further than he already was.

The slight pricking in his neck was the only indication that he had been injected.

Thomas could feel his body drooping. He tried to stay awake, he really did. His head was swaying from the effort and he couldn’t even feel his arm anymore.

Faintly, he could feel his feet being dragged against the ground. The lights flickering around in his vision were cloaked in a haze and somewhat fuzzy.

Something moving fast blurred across his vision, lagging and out of focus from the drug.

The men moved him away from it, he could tell, so Thomas decided that whatever they didn’t want him near- well, shuck them, he was going to go near it.

Thomas realized that, that represented most of his memorable life. How ironic.

His lung’s heaved, trying to keep up with his demands. 

He needed to focus. He needed to focus. He needed a knock to the head, that’s what he needed.

When’d it get so shucking hard to just shucking focus?

Thomas moved, trying to hit something, anything, anywhere.

To his fortune, his arm somehow ached in response. (Thomas swore he had moved his legs, but hey, mission accomplished even if it didn’t go to plan.)

He used it, used it to ground him, to fight against whatever drug had been injected into his system. He had fought tooth and nail to escape from WICKED once and he would _not_ fall prey to them again.

It worked. For a couple precious seconds, it worked, but that was enough.

Minho. The thing the men didn’t want him going near? It was Minho. God bless that shucking spiky-haired man.

Minho was fighting too. Screaming it seemed, even though Thomas couldn’t hear him. 

Thomas wasn’t alone. He and Minho had both survived together for so long, and Thomas knew that they could do it again. They _would_ do it again.

Thomas tried to tell him. Tell him that Newt was alive. Newt was here. They could all be together again.

They could create their own paradise. Not live under a false pretense of safety that WICKED could snatch away from them at any moment they chose.

That they could all be happy. Together.

The key word in that sentence was that Thomas _tried_ to tell him.

He tried to tell him.

And then-

The world went black.

**Author's Note:**

> The initial summary is important to the plot so- yeah.
> 
> Feedback is very much appreciated! I will gladly listen to anything you tell me and if you notice a mistake, please don't hesitate to point it out! 
> 
> Thank you!


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